Race Report- Tour of Little Switzerland Road Race Masters 3/4 35+

After a two-month break from racing, I was excited to finish up the road season in New Glarus at the Tour of Little Switzerland presented by the Brazen Dropouts. Looking at the course profile, 42 miles, about 2700 feet of climbing and an uphill finish, I felt like this was a race I could do well in.

After an uphill neutral roll-out, the breakaway attempts started and this kept the group moving at a fairly fast pace. When we reached the climb at the end of lap two, we caught the Masters 50+ field which had started ahead of us. I quickly moved to the front of the pack with a few other riders. I didn’t want to get caught in the back and get left behind as we passed them.

As we approached the final climb on the 3rd and last lap our pace slowed as everyone tried to recover. This backfired on us as the 50+ group caught back up to us and a few of their riders attacked and passed us. This cause a lot of confusion and I wasn’t able to tell who was in our race anymore. As soon as I was able to find an opening, I moved to the front and was able to see two riders breaking away. I took off and caught the lead rider and as I came up to what I was thinking was the last curve before the finish, I sprinted passed him.

I quickly realized there was one more curve and I was out of gas. I took a look back expecting to see a group of riders passing me, but I was all alone and still had a nice size gap. I sat up and slowly made my way across the finish line in first place. Great way to finish the season, now it cyclocross time!